preference of the silence maker

[zetweeh]

Hai

Is it possible to make the default of the silense-maker to set to 2 seconds?
Every time I use Audacity it starts with 30 seconds.
Thanks
ZetWeeh

[steve]

You mean "Generate > Silence"?
The default length of the Silence generator is hard coded into Audacity. Unless you modify the Audacity source code and build your own copy of the program this cannot be changed.

However, there may be a suitable workaround - what exactly are you doing and why would it be better for the default to be 2 seconds?

[zetweeh]

Indeed, I mean generate-silence.
I make flacs of my LP's and want 2 seconds silence at the beginning and the end.
What is a workaround? And is this a solution for my question!
Thanks for your reply, Steve.
ZetWeeh

[steve]

There's a couple of approaches that you can take. I'll give the steps of how I do it, but I'm not sure that they will work on Audacity 1.2.x as I am using Audacity 1.3.13. I would highly recommend upgrading to Audacity 1.3.13 as it is a lot more functional than the old 1.2.6 version. Also, 1.2.6 is no longer developed and there are some known problems with 1.2.x on modern computers that will not be fixed as all development is on the 1.3.x series. You can get 1.3.13 from here: http://audacityteam.org/download/
If you want to be able to export MP3 files, you should also install the current version of Lame: http://audacityteam.org/help/faq?s=install&i=lame-mp3

You do not need to uninstall 1.2.6 as 1.3.13 will be installed into a different folder. You can have both versions on your machine, but you can't run them both at the same time. Audacity 1.3.13 can open projects that were saved by 1.2.x, but Audacity 1.2.x cannot open projects that have been saved by Audacity 1.3.x.

Now the steps:
To create a 2 second gap at the beginning: Switch to the "Time Shift" tool (double headed arrow button <--> or F5 key) then drag the track to the right.
If you have a wheel mouse you can use Ctrl+Mouse Wheel to zoom in/out to an appropriate level.

To add 2 seconds to the end,
Press "K" to go to the end of the track, then
select "Generate > Silence". The keyboard focus should be on the "3" in the time selection box, so just type "0" then "2" then "Enter".
Until you exit from Audacity the Generate Silence effect will now be set to 2 seconds and keyboard focus will be on the "2".

[zetweeh]

Hai Steve
Thanks for the answer.
Is it possible to hold the 2 seconds for when you start Audacity again.
ZetWeeh

[steve]

Is it possible to hold the 2 seconds for when you start Audacity again.

No, and that's the "feature request" that you can post here: http://forum.audacityteam.org/viewforum.php?f=20